It’s funny, because bulbasaur was supposed to have evolved all the way into venusaur according to the Banpresto poster back in 1999, but the Pokemon Company chickened out.
They simply realized midproduction of the Kanto-arc that the Kanto-arc wasn't going to be the start and finish of the series they had planned because of the amazing popularity.
Hence, I don't think it had anything to do with 'chickening out', but simply them realizing they can't work Ash into a league-winning protagonist when they realized the series would be extended.
I’m thinking that was supposed to happen during Orange Islands/Johto. It’s a shame.
Nah, Pidgeotto's there so definitely the Kanto-arc.
It's a real shame that Tauros didn't stay on as a permanent member of Ash's team; it's a really cool Pokémon, and it was the definition of 'power' back in Gen 1.
It's always a treat when Tauros battled. But yeah, would've been cool to see it on the team or in battles again - but I assume it will never happen again.
I have a bit of a headcanon that is somewhat sinister in a capitalistic/corporate way.
The reason Iris and any other top/known/famous trainers got more scheduled matches earlier (and hence got to M8 quicker) is because they used those appearances in the PWC as brand images to bring in more click/ad/view revenue from the televized/streaming services, ticket sales, merchandise etc.
This actually happens a lot IRL when it comes to professional sports. Just look at franchise related sports when it comes to big star players from any sport.
How? NBA, NFL and European soccer have all teams play equal amounts of games during their regular series? I'm kinda confused as to which professional sports you're alluding to.
What obviously does happen is if you have match x, y and z - and match Y features a player like LeBron and you can only AIR one.. than obviously that will be a consideration to take into account.
What's far more likely is that Ash was pre-occupied with research-stuff while Iris and others kept battling none stop.
People don't realize that the Pokemon Anime was only supposed to run from Kanto and end with Johto. That's how it was teed up but the people who made the show at the time didn't realize how popular it became which nixed alot of different scenarios. As they didn't originally plan on making Pokemon Heroes the 5th Movie. That's why this poster exists.
For example Celebi was in the GS Ball which was supposed to culminate in the 4th Movie, Bulbasaur was supposed to evolve into Ivysaur during the Bulbasaur's Mysterious Garden episode and then into Venusaur in the Battle for the 8th Badge against Team Rocket. Than Tauros would be the 6th member leading into the Pokemon League.
Iirc it was supposed to end with the Kanto-league. As far as I know Gen2 wasn't planned despite the early Ho-oh appearance. The most logical timeline is that they planned a Pokemon series based on the Red and Green versions of the games. Then the hype happened, they reworked Bulbasaur's evolution episode, reworked the last scene of Attack of the Prehistoric Pokemon to include Togepi's egg and to keep Ash as an underdog chose to keep Tauros off the team and then started working on planning Orange Islands..
Honestly kinda believe that Diantha is Leon’s jobber
She does seem like the least likely opponent for Ash to face (along with Steven).
